On the Trail of the Women Warriors: The Amazons in Myth and History

"Golden-shielded, silver-sworded, man-loving, male-child slaughtering Amazons." That is how the fifth century Greek historian Hellanicus described the Amazons, and they have fascinated society ever since. Did they really exist? Until recently scholars consigned them to the world of myth, but Lyn Webster Wilde journeyed into the homeland of the Amazons, and uncovered astoni"Golden-shielded, silver-sworded, man-loving, male-child slaughtering Amazons." That is how the fifth century Greek historian Hellanicus described the Amazons, and they have fascinated society ever since. Did they really exist? Until recently scholars consigned them to the world of myth, but Lyn Webster Wilde journeyed into the homeland of the Amazons, and uncovered astonishing evidence of their historic reality.

North of the Black Sea she found archaeological excavations of graves of Iron Age women buried with arrows, swords, and armor. In the hidden world of the Hittites, near the Amazons' ancient capital of Themiscyra in Anatolia, she unearthed traces of powerful priestesses, women-only religious cults and an armed bisexual goddess - all possible sources for the ferocious warrior women.

Combining scholarly penetration with a sense of adventure, Webster Wilde has explored a largely unknown field and produced a coherent and absorbing book, which challenges our preconceived notions of what men and women can do....more

Hardcover, 240 pages

Published
July 24th 2000
by Thomas Dunne Books
(first published February 15th 1999)

Community Reviews

An interesting read. It is quite amazing how much is interpreted through the eyes of others and the piece and guess work that needs to be done. I so disagree with the last few pages; saying that wild "female" power needed to be admired, tamed and wiped out to get to our level of "civilization" today is just plain insulting to all those who paid and continue to pay the price of misogony in name of so-called progress and patriarchy. There are other such foul statements in the last couple of pages An interesting read. It is quite amazing how much is interpreted through the eyes of others and the piece and guess work that needs to be done. I so disagree with the last few pages; saying that wild "female" power needed to be admired, tamed and wiped out to get to our level of "civilization" today is just plain insulting to all those who paid and continue to pay the price of misogony in name of so-called progress and patriarchy. There are other such foul statements in the last couple of pages that almost ruin the book as a whole. However, still an interesting read that will make me view a few things around me with slightly different brain borders....more

"The Amazon's are a memory of a kind of female power, the nature of which we have almost entirely forgotten."

Lyn Webster Wilde does a great job of digging into the research on ancient/bronze age warrior women. No, she doesn't pinpoint the land of Amazons, but she puts forward interesting research on matriarchal societies, societies in which there is evidence of women warriors.

At certain points, she channels ritual so effectively I almost feel the sweep of the spirit brushing past my ears. The G"The Amazon's are a memory of a kind of female power, the nature of which we have almost entirely forgotten."

Lyn Webster Wilde does a great job of digging into the research on ancient/bronze age warrior women. No, she doesn't pinpoint the land of Amazons, but she puts forward interesting research on matriarchal societies, societies in which there is evidence of women warriors.

At certain points, she channels ritual so effectively I almost feel the sweep of the spirit brushing past my ears. The Goddess of Catal Huyuk is such a passage. So are her descriptions of trance dancing and Dervish ecstasy.

Not quite what I was expecting. I expected it to be about the amazon legends and mythology. The author instead was writing more of what the amazons symbolized, might have originated from, and quite a bit of feminist lore to it. I was expecting it to be devoted to the amazons, not coming from the angle that she wrote. It isn't bad. Just not what I was wanting or expecting. Great for those who want to come at the amazons from a research angle that comes from angles of they weren't real or might'veNot quite what I was expecting. I expected it to be about the amazon legends and mythology. The author instead was writing more of what the amazons symbolized, might have originated from, and quite a bit of feminist lore to it. I was expecting it to be devoted to the amazons, not coming from the angle that she wrote. It isn't bad. Just not what I was wanting or expecting. Great for those who want to come at the amazons from a research angle that comes from angles of they weren't real or might've been real, but came from something else entirely. Not quite sure how to put it. ...more

This is such an incredibly interesting topic, but the organization of the book and the way it was written made it a struggle to get through. I was so looking forward to learning more about the Amazon legends and folklore, but the information was just not presented in a manner that kept my attention. It was like reading a student's long winded final paper.She repeats the same facts over...and over...and over. It is numbing.